FIFA World Cup 2026 :Canada/Mexico/United States: Discussion Thread

[StarenseN]

Honestly what's was Roberto Martinez trying to prove still leaving Cristiano Ronaldo on the field. On the big stage as the world cup the coach is meant to make the hard decision.
I think starting him is enough respect you can give to a legend of Portugal and the football game but age isn't on his side so he should not be playing 90minutes especially when the team needed to score.
I will take nothing away from Drc Congo because they played well and they deserved to get the point.

The last time Cristiano Ronaldo was benched in the World Cup and Portugal was knocked out of the 2022 World Cup, Portugal coach was blamed for that because he didn't start Cristiano Ronaldo against Morocco in Portugal quarter final match against Morocco in the 2022 World Cup, so I believe Robert Martinez doesn't want to bench Cristiano Ronaldo or sub him off when Portugal is searching for a win so that he won't be blame if exit the World Cup. The only way Portugal would have play without Cristiano Ronaldo in this World Cup was if Roberto Martinez didn't named him in the Portugal World Cup squad but since his name is there, Roberto Martinez have no choice but to play Cristiano Ronaldo always.

To be fair, that was 4 years ago, and he was 4 years younger than right now, about roughly 37 years old if I am not wrong, and as we all know Ronaldo does take care of himself, so his 37 years old is like most peoples 30 years old at most.

So leaving him on the bench in 2022 was not a great decision, and to be fair was not a terrible decision neither because even if he played in that game, they would have probably lost, but I could at least understand that game. Now? Dude is almost 42, and of course not playing him would make a lot more sense now than 4 years ago.

[emrecemsan]

Portugal needs to get rid of Ronaldo immediately. He isn't helping the team in any way. He was so ineffective yesterday and he was absolutely one of the factors in that point loss. 

They need a better teamwork than this. Ronaldo shouldn't be the target on the front line anymore. I respect his career a lot but he is just done now. Messi is making a much higher contribution to his national team now.

[Solokan]

Well, Portugal disappointed in their first game. To be honest, I'm not surprised by this result. They've had serious problems in attack, and this coach can't seem to create a better formation with the right starting players. For example, he benched João Félix, Francisco Trincão, and Rafael Leão, and the result was very disappointing. This draw could have serious consequences in the future. They'll need to hope that the other teams in the group lose so that they don't lose in their next two games.

You're right, with the kind of players at his disposal we still see this kind of mistake from the coach, from the DR Congo lineup, it's evident that they came to defend, 5 man backline only tells you one thing, the opponent is here to defend and he should have changed his own lineup. Team lineups are available 1 hour before kickoff, so how come Martinez didn't anticipate the defence after seeing their lineup? Today's draw was more of coaching error than players, although they took have their own portion of blame but the coach should take responsibility of this draw and win their next 2 games if they are to top their group

Yes, I also saw the Portuguese coach make a small mistake because he couldn't create a strategy to get the Congolese defenders out. If he had, there would have been potential for the Portuguese players to infiltrate the Congolese defense and possibly score many goals. But unfortunately, the coach couldn't create a good strategy in that match. But I also saw Roberto Martinez create a good strategy, but he didn't create a good strategy from the start. It was evident in the final minutes of the match that Portugal always launched strong attacks

It's a shame that Joao Felix didn't play in that match, even though I think it would have been better if Joao Felix and the players you mentioned had played. I think if Joao Felix had played, there would have been a different sensation especially since Joao Felix is ​​​​a close friend of Ronaldo because they were on the same team at Al Nassr
So I think Portugal's game could have been better if Joao Felix had played. But now everything has happened and I hope Martinez can learn from his experience and ultimately improve the Portuguese players' game

[|MINER|]

Ronaldo was off balance on most of the chance but however as the Portugal first match  and a player that we have always compare with Messi should have still score for his country even if is not more than one but unfortunately he was neither the scorer of Portugal or the best performing player of the country because most players even performed than Ronaldo and Portugal was not attacking DR Congo through Ronaldo because they were exploiting more other means. DR Congo was unexpectedly awesome on the match because all the impression of the match was for the wining to come from Portugal because is usually hard to see a squad like Portugal and doesn't think they will be the winner.

Actually I think that even a good player needs the help of his teammates to get 100% of his performance output. In this case I think Cristiano Ronaldo gets very little help from other players in Portugal. On the other hand if we talk about Messi then other players in Argentina fully support him.
And besides, Cristiano Ronaldo himself is a bit off form. And then the main thing is how many more years can a person actually stay in form? He is now 41 years old, it is normal for him to be out of form. And I think this legendary player has achieved enough success and whether it is or not, when he goes into retirement, I think he will go with full dignity.

[ruykeri]

Argentina has ended the first period of the game with a goal by Messi. Top bin and the keeper was unable to keep it out. it's a wonderful pressing against Algeria and at some point, they had to play defensive against the South Americans because of the dip in pressure. Although in the final third of the first period, Algeria took their pass completion seriously-- I believe the coach told them the truth, which is 'the best way to defend properly is attack'There's still much left for Messi to unleash into the game, but until then, let's hope Algeria doesn't push and break into their defense as the two straight attempts have been threatening.

Argentina vs Algeria match was really great. I was a little skeptical about what Argentina would do after seeing that the last few matches were just draws. But they won very easily. It feels even better that Messi scored 3 goals in the first match of the World Cup. Messi's goal scoring was really good. The goal he scored from outside the box was just in the blink of an eye. He doesn't miss any opportunities. If he keeps up this consistency and doesn't get injured, then this World Cup will be a good opportunity for Argentina as well.

[BitBakerr1]

Portugal needs to get rid of Ronaldo immediately. He isn't helping the team in any way. He was so ineffective yesterday and he was absolutely one of the factors in that point loss. 

They need a better teamwork than this. Ronaldo shouldn't be the target on the front line anymore. I respect his career a lot but he is just done now. Messi is making a much higher contribution to his national team now.

Do you really watched the match or you just checked live score and saw that Portugal played draw and being a Messi fan you decide to put the blame on Ronaldo, a lot of you coming here to talk about a particular match don’t even watch those match you people just go to live score and then come here to post.
If you really watched that match yesterday you will know that the fault and the reason why Portugal didn’t win that match was because of the midfield and not Ronaldo, let me educate you a little bit, as a striker your major duty or rule in a match is to score goal and how those that happen when ball is passed for you to score and in yesterdays match they didn’t give Ronaldo good passes for him to score.
The motivation in that Portugal team is Ronaldo and if he should leave the team the motivation won’t be this way, the reason why all eyes are in Portugal is because of Ronaldo.
Messi is a great player but even Messi sees Ronaldo as a great player too so be guided.

[BluebloodCXVI]

Portugal needs to get rid of Ronaldo immediately. He isn't helping the team in any way. He was so ineffective yesterday and he was absolutely one of the factors in that point loss. 

They need a better teamwork than this. Ronaldo shouldn't be the target on the front line anymore. I respect his career a lot but he is just done now. Messi is making a much higher contribution to his national team now.

Portugal vs DRC result wasn’t Ronaldo fault at all. His team players didn’t play well with him and their defenders didn’t impress me at all. I was so pissed at the way they didn’t stick to their position and allowed DRC players to enter deep into Portugal’s own half. Even their wingers were not crossing the ball into the DRC box 18 as much as I thought they would even when they had opportunities to. Ronaldo could have scored a header if they had done that consistently. But no, they preferred to be passing back. How were they expecting to win with such poor performance and now everybody is trying to blame Ronaldo as if they expect him to play every position on the field. C’mon y’all should cut this man some slack he is 41 years old for God sake. Even the two chances that CR7 got were not clean enough for him to maximize them so why blame him ?.

[MArsland]

Portugal needs to get rid of Ronaldo immediately. He isn't helping the team in any way. He was so ineffective yesterday and he was absolutely one of the factors in that point loss. 

They need a better teamwork than this. Ronaldo shouldn't be the target on the front line anymore. I respect his career a lot but he is just done now. Messi is making a much higher contribution to his national team now.

Unfortunately that's not going to happen, even if you don't like Ronaldo, no problem, don't watch his matches. This is his last World Cup after all, so there's no reason for the Portugal coach to get rid of him. Ronaldo may not help much, but at least he still has a role in the main squad as a senior player. I know this kind of frustration is bound to happen, especially when Portugal fail to win. Blame one person, but if you watch the game then there are many players who also wasted opportunities.

Guess what, you didn't watch it, did you?

[bastisisca]

Exactly, this is something i don't understand, but it may also be useful for teams that don't spend much time together to actually understand their value on the pitch and who is better placed to play matches, certainly a test bed to try to find the right team that can always do better in official matches.

Managing, administering and coaching a team is not an easy task, otherwise we would all be coaches.
Then there are many managerial roles within the same team that are necessary to complete a team that has to make many decisions, all of them important.
It's not easy i assure you.

[Callido]

Source: https://www.pdiperjuanganbali.id/portugal-ditahan-imbang-rd-kongo]
Portugal had more opportunities in my own view than Dr Congo, they didn't just initialize it enough, though I will agree with you that Congo approached the game with tight defence, making it hard for Portugal to easily penetrate, even the few chances Ronaldo missed were majorly on tight angles and close marking, so it wasn't an easy one. What I expected Portugal to do, was to strike from outside the 18 yard box more. However I've been very careful with my bet this period, because the countries that people seem to look as underdogs have been surprising their doubters, so ever since, I've been careful with my choice of selection.

It was really a disappointing performance from the Portugal team and a bad start to the World Cup competition. Though DR Congo had a strong wall to block attacks from every corner and that was commendable, but it was possible to break through that defense with players like Bruno Fernandez and Vitinha in the midfield and secure a win.

With the current performance,  I don't see that Portugal would have a good run in the World Cup this year, accompanied with the current form of Christiano Ronaldo who is not so fit for the runs and finish the attack deserves.

[vs2014]

This World Cup has brought so many surprises, especially with the favourite teams ending up in draws. Portugal is one of them Who showed a surprising result 1-1 draw against DR Congo. Portugal looked confident from beginning and they taking an early lead, Joao Neves Scored a goal at 6th minutes. but failed to maintain the attacking pressure from their opponent and unfortunately allowed their opponents to come back into the game. DR Congo showed great fighting skill and Yoane Wissa took the chance well just before the end of first half and his goal equalized the Score and the score Remained same till the end. Portugal need to improve their finishing and decision-making in the upcoming matches as this world cup is getting exciting and unexpectable

[paco92x]

Honestly what's was Roberto Martinez trying to prove still leaving Cristiano Ronaldo on the field. On the big stage as the world cup the coach is meant to make the hard decision.
I think starting him is enough respect you can give to a legend of Portugal and the football game but age isn't on his side so he should not be playing 90minutes especially when the team needed to score.
I will take nothing away from Drc Congo because they played well and they deserved to get the point.

I don't think that Ronaldo is to blame here, it's the whole team. You need to deliver the ball to Ronaldo and he will do the rest, but if no one is there to deliver, Ronaldo will struggle and it will look like he played badly. The problem was in the midfield, which was totally cut off from the play. Congo managed to outrun and win on muscle in the center of the field, and the result of that was that we didn't see Vitinha, Neves, or even Bruno. With that in mind, you can't blame Ronaldo for underperforming.

[Pablo-wood]

Exactly, this is something i don't understand, but it may also be useful for teams that don't spend much time together to actually understand their value on the pitch and who is better placed to play matches, certainly a test bed to try to find the right team that can always do better in official matches.

Managing, administering and coaching a team is not an easy task, otherwise we would all be coaches.
Then there are many managerial roles within the same team that are necessary to complete a team that has to make many decisions, all of them important.
It's not easy i assure you.

Team management isn't an easy task but  by virtue of taking up a management role then so much is expected from every decision made. This coaches were trained for to do the task and the also have confidence in themselves they can deliver. We know they can't do beyond their ability but that which their ability can produce should be worth the time and energy invested to see the team advance through the various stages until they get to a point they can't their effort can't lead them anymore.

[Fakhrulenclix]

This World Cup has brought so many surprises, especially with the favourite teams ending up in draws. Portugal is one of them Who showed a surprising result 1-1 draw against DR Congo. Portugal looked confident from beginning and they taking an early lead, Joao Neves Scored a goal at 6th minutes. but failed to maintain the attacking pressure from their opponent and unfortunately allowed their opponents to come back into the game. DR Congo showed great fighting skill and Yoane Wissa took the chance well just before the end of first half and his goal equalized the Score and the score Remained same till the end. Portugal need to improve their finishing and decision-making in the upcoming matches as this world cup is getting exciting and unexpectable

It's a big surprise that happened in the first week of the world cup and I don't see any problem with Portugal's performance, they are just unlucky and it's exactly the same as what Spain experienced in their first match when they only played a series against Cape Verde and for Portugal and Spain I am still very optimistic that these two teams will be able to rise and go further because indeed from the beginning Portugal and Spain are teams that are in favor to win the title.

[KTChampions]

This World Cup has brought so many surprises, especially with the favourite teams ending up in draws. Portugal is one of them Who showed a surprising result 1-1 draw against DR Congo. Portugal looked confident from beginning and they taking an early lead, Joao Neves Scored a goal at 6th minutes. but failed to maintain the attacking pressure from their opponent and unfortunately allowed their opponents to come back into the game. DR Congo showed great fighting skill and Yoane Wissa took the chance well just before the end of first half and his goal equalized the Score and the score Remained same till the end. Portugal need to improve their finishing and decision-making in the upcoming matches as this world cup is getting exciting and unexpectable

I don't see any critical problems for Portugal. For some reason, when Spain, Brazil, Belgium, and other big favorites drop points, no one makes a big deal out of it or calls for urgent action. We all know that this mostly comes from the fanboy and hater camps trolling each other. My point is that this is a normal fluctuation in the result, and given the tournament format (8 teams from third place get into the playoffs haha) it doesn’t mean anything in terms of tournament struggle. Another issue is that such outcomes destroy bettors en masse, but Spain's result still stands out from the competition right now. There wasn't even a single goal.

[Crakryptvest]

Portugal needs to get rid of Ronaldo immediately. He isn't helping the team in any way. He was so ineffective yesterday and he was absolutely one of the factors in that point loss. 

They need a better teamwork than this. Ronaldo shouldn't be the target on the front line anymore. I respect his career a lot but he is just done now. Messi is making a much higher contribution to his national team now.

Do you really watched the match or you just checked live score and saw that Portugal played draw and being a Messi fan you decide to put the blame on Ronaldo, a lot of you coming here to talk about a particular match don’t even watch those match you people just go to live score and then come here to post.
If you really watched that match yesterday you will know that the fault and the reason why Portugal didn’t win that match was because of the midfield and not Ronaldo, let me educate you a little bit, as a striker your major duty or rule in a match is to score goal and how those that happen when ball is passed for you to score and in yesterdays match they didn’t give Ronaldo good passes for him to score.
The motivation in that Portugal team is Ronaldo and if he should leave the team the motivation won’t be this way, the reason why all eyes are in Portugal is because of Ronaldo.
Messi is a great player but even Messi sees Ronaldo as a great player too so be guided.

Your points are clear but with what I noticed in that match, Ronaldo is now old, I know him very well and what he can do, although he's a good player and I don't think anyone will argue that very fact, I don't want to start blaming anyone or comparing individuals, I don't think that it's necessary, Portugal played the match as a team, Ronaldo didn't have much of the ball to score as you rightly said but I will still say that when Ronaldo was the Ronaldo we know, he goes for the ball, he doesn't wait for the ball to come and meet him, even if we know that a striker position for a pass to be given to him for him to do the final job, strikers also go for the ball but whatever, even though we want to put blames, it shouldn't be Ronaldo alone.

[eaLiTy]

Portugal needs to get rid of Ronaldo immediately. He isn't helping the team in any way. He was so ineffective yesterday and he was absolutely one of the factors in that point loss.  

They need a better teamwork than this. Ronaldo shouldn't be the target on the front line anymore. I respect his career a lot but he is just done now. Messi is making a much higher contribution to his national team now.

I can understand the sentiment that Cristiano Ronaldo did not play well and take Portugal to victory, and yes my opinion is not different either but do not want to pin solely on Ronaldo. Portugal played really bad, their defensive game was nowhere near the required standard, let alone the mid field and attack.

Most of the time, these comparisons and complaints arise right after Lionel Messi single handedly took Argentina to victory with a hat-trick. One of the main reason for this is that Argentina's midfield is completely centered around Messi. While with Portugal, you rarely see the midfield giving Ronaldo the ball. Ultimately, a striker cannot do any magic without getting the ball.  

[Bitcoin_people]

Portugal needs to get rid of Ronaldo immediately. He isn't helping the team in any way. He was so ineffective yesterday and he was absolutely one of the factors in that point loss. 

They need a better teamwork than this. Ronaldo shouldn't be the target on the front line anymore. I respect his career a lot but he is just done now. Messi is making a much higher contribution to his national team now.

You may notice that Ronaldo is definitely a great player but he didn't perform that well in this match. So Portugal shouldn't leave him out of the starting XI because he can play badly in one match but he can perform great in the next match. Basically, a player shouldn't be judged by one match, rather we saw Messi play great in his first match but we can't say how good his performance will be in the next match. In that case, Cristiano Ronaldo has made a statement that maybe they will come back with a better understanding in the next match and correct the mistakes that were made in this match. I saw this game completed, although Ronaldo was not very effective in the attack but the opposing team's players prevented him, but I believe that the next match will definitely bring something good. Portugal should play with a good combination of each player so that Ronaldo can do something good in the last World Cup of his career.

[Stavri]

Argentina has ended the first period of the game with a goal by Messi. Top bin and the keeper was unable to keep it out. it's a wonderful pressing against Algeria and at some point, they had to play defensive against the South Americans because of the dip in pressure. Although in the final third of the first period, Algeria took their pass completion seriously-- I believe the coach told them the truth, which is 'the best way to defend properly is attack'There's still much left for Messi to unleash into the game, but until then, let's hope Algeria doesn't push and break into their defense as the two straight attempts have been threatening.

Argentina vs Algeria match was really great. I was a little skeptical about what Argentina would do after seeing that the last few matches were just draws. But they won very easily. It feels even better that Messi scored 3 goals in the first match of the World Cup. Messi's goal scoring was really good. The goal he scored from outside the box was just in the blink of an eye. He doesn't miss any opportunities. If he keeps up this consistency and doesn't get injured, then this World Cup will be a good opportunity for Argentina as well.

yeah. i really tip my hat to the composure and intelligence in Messi's second goal. he struck it so softly and cleverly that all we could do was just watch and enjoy.
i hope we get to see Messi play in the 2030 World Cup too.

[kennycryptoitalia]

Clearly, that was a serious foul. But strangely enough, the referee didn't even give Messi a yellow card, let alone a red one. It's no wonder this incident has sparked a lot of discussion on social media. Some have even accused FIFA of protecting Messi. If any other player had committed a foul like that, they would have definitely received a red card. But since it was Messi, the referee just ignored it.

I think that when they say that Messi is a FIFA boy this is true, they always help him in some way, because he is most likely the idol of Infantino and co. but this is not to worry because this year they have sent teams that seem to be very serious and they won't do as well as last time.